Douji
by Faia Saiyajin
Summary: A bit of closure for us Anubis fans. Just what happened when Anubis gave his life for Kayura? (I'll gripe about that later) Could this be the last chance to set his life straight?


title: Douji  
series: Ronin Warriors, with a half a smattering of YST-related influences  
author: Faia Saiyajin  
rating: PG  
--::insert normal disclaimer here::  
--------------------  
  
So this was the afterlife. Or perhaps the doorway to the great beyond. Anubis pondered his surroundings, pushing his snarled red hair from his face. He was standing in a village. A silent, ghost-town type of village. It was if everyone had just suddenly vanished.  
  
Clothes that had been hung in the sun to dry were left unattended, parcels and packages scattered on the ground. The monthly shipment of rice had even been abandoned, bags of the precious food still sitting in a large heap beside a cart, still hitched to an oxen that wasn't even there. The animals had gone missing as well.  
  
Odd... very odd. He took several steps into the square, to the well. Buckets left sitting on the stone rim were full, whoever had been sent for water deserting their task.  
  
"Peculiar..." he murmured. This looked eerily familiar, somehow. Wait... a voice, whispering, coming from inside some poor hovel. Anubis' eyes flicked over the home, a simple structure of wood, with a reed-thatch roof. The makeshift doorway of cloth stretched between four bamboo poles was open, swinging slowly.  
  
His curiousity piqued, he moved closer to the home, his sandaled feet making no noise on the dusty earth. He was still wearing the blue and white robes of the Ancient One, soiled with mud, sweat, and blood as they might be. He was also still damp from his fall into the stream, and he shivered in the chill air.  
  
Drawing closer to the doorway, he heard the voice. A crying child, the weeping muffled by fabric. He pressed his back against the wall, craning his neck nearer to the opening, trying to hear more.  
  
The whimpering child hiccuped several times, trying to find its voice. "Mama... mama... " The youth was near hysterics, and merely speaking of whatever had happened in the village only made their cries harder. Anubis blinked slowly. Had everyone been abducted? But how? And why?  
  
The child, in an effort to console itself, began singing quietly, perhaps a song taught by the missing mother. As the child, whom Anubis guessed was a young boy, perhaps 10, grew more calm, his singing grew louder, Anubis able to understand the words.  
  
His eyes went wide. He knew this song. It was his song. He closed his eyes, trying to remember. Great gods, it was so long ago. But it became clearer, as he rummaged through the clutter of his past. The words came slowly, as did the memories.   
  
He was nine years old. Out playing in the fields, playing.  
  
He heard the noises. Screams, shouts, oxen baying, the thunder of hooves. So he ran. He hid underneath a fallen tree log, until all was silent. Upon creeping back to his village, he found it in ruin. Everyone was...  
  
Anubis opened his eyes, that burned with tears. The village had transformed from a deserted town, to the site of a massacre. Everything was ruined. The air was filled with the smell of blood and smoke. Bodies lay everywhere, killed where they were standing. Homes were destroyed, oxen lay dead or dying, riddled with arrows. Fires still smouldered on the remains of houses and gardens. He was the only one left alive.  
  
He didn't want to do it, didn't want to have to face that reality again. That he was alone. Alone forever. But he took a breath, steeling himself. Anubis pivoted on his heel, standing in the doorway.  
  
There he was. A small boy, crying in the center of the room. His mother lay facedown in a pool of blood, her throat cut. His father would be out in the garden, gutted like a fish. And because of his cowardice, he had survived.  
  
The boy curled in the corner of the room, clutching a ragged bear, looked up at him. His eyes went wide in fear, as he tried to back further into the corner, trying to escape. "S..stay 'way!!"  
  
Anubis could only stare at the child, his young self, his russet hair just beginning to grow out in the fashion he wore it now. His eyes were wide and bloodshot from crying, full of fear. But this was only the beginning of the nightmare. It was starting all over again.  
  
"Shh... I'm not.. not going to hurt you." He managed. He dipped down on one knee, his arms open, to reassure and invite.   
  
Young Anubis surveyed the stranger. He was dressed like a monk, and he was dirty and smelled of blood... could he be another survivor? Without another thought, driven by horror and grief, the child dove into the arms of the man. "Mama... mama.. p-p-papa...!!" The child repeated his dead parents names over and over like a litany, as if the words would bring them to life.   
  
Anubis embraced his younger self, ignoring the tears that streaked down his face. "It's allright..." He searched his mind for the affectionate word. "Quiet, little Red Sparrow." Red Sparrow. His mother's pet name for him. Mostly because of his red hair and normally cheerful childish demeanor. Upon being called Red Sparrow, young Anubis stiffened, and looked up at himself.  
  
"Who...?" In the dim light of the room, the child surveyed the man who had just called him his secret nickname. He couldn't see the face of the man, but could see his bright green eyes. Green eyes... like his. "Who.. who are you?" He asked gently. His small hands fingered the ear of a tattered teddy bear, his only true friend in the village.  
  
"I..." Anubis began. How to explain that he was the child's future self? "I.. I am a friend."  
  
"Oh." Young Anubis was satisfied with the answer. "What's your name...?" He cuddled his face in the soft blue robes the man wore. He smelled of good things. Incense and tea leaves.  
  
"Call me..." Anubis' smile was bittersweet. "Call me Douji." The cruel word the other Warlords used on him, meaning Child... simply because he was so young and brash.  
  
"O..okay. My name's Anubis." The child squeaked.  
  
"Very nice to meet you." Anubis couldn't bring himself to say his name.  
  
"Mmhm. ...why did this happen, Douji?" The juvenile nearly burst into tears again.  
  
"I... I don't know."  
  
"My Mama and Papa... they're dead."  
  
"I know.. I know." Anubis' eyes squeezed shut at the memory of finding his slain parents. Little Anubis backed away, looking at the body of his mother. He hugged his bear tighter, whimpering.   
  
"It will be okay, ...A-Anubis." He stood, his feet taking him over to where the woman lay. "You may think that your world is destroyed... but you'll recover. You'll grow strong. This will all seem as if it were a bad dream." The woman's face pointed in his direction, her eyes still open. He bent, his fingers sweeping down over her fair face, closing the eyes and the undead stare therein.   
  
"How do you know?" Anubis stood behind him, clutching at both bear and the sleeve of his older counterpart's robes.  
  
"I just do."  
  
"But what am I going to..to do?"  
  
Anubis closed his eyes. Hours after his village was destroyed, another daimyo would arrive. Anubis would be taken, and raised in the castle just outside of Kyoto. He would train hard, using the memories of this tragedy to grow strong. Resentful. Full of hatred. Hatred for the cruel world, at the uncaring hand of fate that had dealt him such a painful blow. Years would pass. ..and then Talpa would come into power. Anubis' life would change forever. He would have the power he lusted after. The ability to control everything, even his own destiny, with the terrible Cruelty Armor. He went from innocent child to fearsome Ogre, striking down anyone who stood in his way.  
  
"D..Douji?" The man had drifted away, thinking of something. But his face looked so afraid. Now that he was kneeling closer to the light, Anubis could see the older man. He had reddish hair. Just like him. Maybe his Mama called him Red Sparrow, too?  
  
Anubis senior banished the reverie with a light shake of his head. "Come. We will bury them."   
  
"O..okay."  
  
Two hours later, Anubis'parents had been placed in the earth, underneath what had been his mother's garden. Douji mopped his brow, sinking the point of the shovel into the ground. He sat on the remains of a wall, his clothes now twice as dirty as before. Anubis sat beside him.  
  
"Thank you..."  
  
"You're welcome, little one." Douji smiled down at the boy. Here he was, so young and fresh, untainted by hatred and evil, full of potential. Perhaps now was the last time he ever felt alive. ..that is, until the fateful day of the slaughter. Anubis still hugged his teddy bear. Douji managed a grin. He still had that bear, even as his days as a Warlord. His own mother had made it for him... to comfort him when he was afraid. But when you are a Demon General, there is no room for fear. He pushed his hair from his face, and looked at Anubis.  
  
"Anubis... what do you want to be when you grow up?"  
  
The boy drew his knees up to his chin, hugging them, teddy bear mashed against his chest. "Hmm.. I think I'd like to be a scholar. Y'know.. read and learn."   
  
"What about a warrior? Or a daimyo, perhaps?"  
  
Anubis the younger's face went sour. "No. All those warlords do is hurt people." He stood, kicking at a clump of greenery. "Like they did to me and my momma. I hate them. I want them all to die."  
  
Douji felt his heart stop. This was it. The beginning of the end. The seed of hatred planted in his heart. The seed that would blossom into a tangled mass of rage and bloodlust, long thorns buried deep within him, their hold unbreakable. That is, until Kaosu, the monk, appeared, and his life took another sharp turn.  
  
"Listen carefully to me, Anubis." The boy's head jerked sharply in Douji's direction as he spoke. "There is something I need to tell you."  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"I know all too well the anger you feel. But you mustn't let it consume you. Anger is a powerful thing. And it is so easy.. so easy to say you hate." He drew the boy before him, his hands on his shoulders, as he looked into those wide green eyes. "Rage is a disease. It will eat you alive inside, and turn you into something worse than the men that did this to your village. It will burn in your heart like a fire, killing away all other feeling, until it is the sole thing you dedicate your life to." His words were heavy, intense, his eyes boring into his younger self. "And you cannot let that happen, Red Sparrow. You need to let go of the hatred. It can bring you only so far in life's journey. It will push you to the limits, and then it will destroy you, from the inside out. Do you understand?"  
  
The child nodded mutely, scared out of his wits. But he collected himself. "I think I understand, Douji."  
  
"There is a long road ahead of you, Anubis. And you must face it with courage. There will be people who will try to corrupt you, to turn you into something evil and despicable. But you must never falter. Do not give into their offerings, no matter how great they may seem. They will promise you everything under the stars, to win you over. Never give in to them. Always try to see the true nature of people. Do not allow yourself to become clouded. There are two sides to every coin. There is no love without hate, and no light without darkness. But you must be brave. Be loyal unto yourself, above all things."  
  
When Douji was finished, Anubis smiled. "I will, Douji. I'll do just as you say. I won't surrender my dreams to fear."   
  
"Good." Douji forced a smile, and stood. He needed to leave this place. The words he had said to Anubis were echoing in his mind. "I must depart now. I have business elsewhere." he whispered.  
  
"I know, Douji. And thank you." The child's smile was as brilliant as the sun. Had Anubis just saved himself from a fate worse than death? "But before you go.." His diminutive arms held out the bear, offering it to the man. "Take this with you."   
  
"Your bear?"  
  
"Mama made it for me. She said it would keep me company. I want you to have it... so you'll never forget me."  
  
"...thank you, Anubis." He reverently took the toy, and then looked at Anubis. There was a double meaning in the childs words. 'Never forget me'.   
  
"And now you understand, don't you, Douji?" Anubis said.   
  
Anubis did. He had told the boy just what he himself had needed to be told at that age, to prevent himself from becoming what had been his undoing. But his time on this world was over, and understanding had come too late, at the expense of his life. He had done just what he had told Anubis not to do, and had given into rage and the promises of untold power. "I do, Anubis. And I thank you." The tears that streamed down his face were no longer tears of regret and sorrow. It was over. But he had the chance to start again, to do it right this time. He would not forget what the innocence of his childhood had told him, that even in a time of utter despair, it was still possible to hold onto your dreams.  
  
The child nodded, and the village faded away, leaving Anubis in the center of a vast expanse of light. Anubis turned, holding the bear to his chest, when a voice called softly behind him.   
  
"Red Sparrow... welcome home." It was a woman, who put her hands over his own, kissing his brow gently.  
  
"Yes. It is good to be home, mama."  
  
  
FIN 


End file.
